The descriptive title of this invention is xe2x80x9cReminding Device.xe2x80x9d This invention relates to a portable device which can remind users whether the state of security of a object that is dependent in part upon electronics for operation has changed (for example, but not by way of limitation, whether an electric garage door has been closed.)
More particularly, the invention relates to a device that is readily transportable (i.e. transported with the user, on his person or in his vehicle), which can be utilized with a variety of objects dependent in part upon electronics for operation, from objects with door and door-like apparatuses (for example, but not by way of limitation, a electric garage door, the door to a house with an electronic lock, a gate with an electric sensing device that determines whether or not the gate is closed, a safe with an electronic device to confirm that the lock is secure) to a variety of electronic devices (for example, but not by way of limitation, an alarm system, a television set, a copy machine, a computer), such that the user or others can determine whether the state of security has changed (for example, but not by way of limitation, whether a garage door has been closed, the copy machine has been turned off, the alarm system turned on), the time that said security changed, or whether the operation of changing said security has been performed multiple times in a short period of time.
The reminding device relates to the need of people to be reminded whether they have performed a mundane or repetitive task. Basically, the brain performs mundane or repetitive tasks with little or no conscious thought, and, as a result, a person cannot reliably remember whether said task was performed at all.
The following example should make plain the problem. You get into your car in the garage, start up the engine, exit the garage, and drive away. During this brief period, you may put on a seat belt, adjust the radio station, try to remember whether there was something else you were to bring with you that day, go over in your mind what tasks need to be done that day, stop the kids from fighting in the back seat (surely this never happens to you), observe a neighborhood child and make sure you don""t run over her, maybe talk to your spouse about upcoming plans, avoid the car that is coming down the street, and, oh yes, if you remember, close the garage door by pressing the button on the remote transmitter.
Half way to work or some other task, you ask yourself: xe2x80x9cDid I close the garage door?xe2x80x9d And you do not, for the life of you, remember. Your spouse (if in the car) doesn""t remember for sure, either. xe2x80x9cI think you did . . . No, I don""t remember for sure.xe2x80x9d
What do you do? You can return home, most frequently finding that it was, indeed, closed, or continue on, knowing that it probably is closed, but taking the chance that it is not, and that the garage, its contents, and perhaps your very house, is open to invasion. The purpose of this Patent is to avoid that dilemma.
This failure to remember mundane or repetitive tasks has a scientific basis and understanding. Newsweek Magazine, Jun. 15, 1998, page 49 ff, reports that people have two kinds of memory, xe2x80x9cworking memoryxe2x80x9d and long term memory. The working, or short term, memory has very limited capacity. Accordingly, to conserve short term memory, the brain tends to not xe2x80x9crememberxe2x80x9d whether or not it has performed certain routine tasks.
Said article provides a short xe2x80x9ctestxe2x80x9d, including questions as: xe2x80x9cHow often do you forget whether you did something, such as lock the door or turn off the lights or the oven?xe2x80x9d Said article explains:
xe2x80x9cContrary to popular wisdom, our brains don""t record everything that happens to us and then bury it until a hypnotist or a therapist helps us dredge it up. Most of what we perceive hovers briefly in working memory, a mental play space akin to a computer""s RAM (or random-access memory), then simply evaporates. xe2x80x9cWe can will things into long-term memory simply by rehearsing them. But the decision to store and discard a piece of information rarely involves any conscious thought. It is usually handled automatically by the hippocampus, a small, two-winged structure nestled deep in the center of the brain. Like a keyboard on your computer, the hippocampus serves as a kind of switching station. As neurons out in the cortex receive sensory information, they relay it to the hippocampus. If the hippocampus responds, the sensory neurons start forming a durable network. But without that act of consent, the experience vanishes forever .
xe2x80x9c. . . As Columbia University neuroscientist Eric Kandel puts it, xe2x80x98you want to keep the junk of everyday life out of the way so you can focus on what matters.xe2x80x99 Perfect retention may sound like a godsend, but when the hippocampus gets overly permissive, the results can be devastating. Neurologists sometimes encounter people with superhuman memories. These savants can recite colossal strings of facts, words and numbers. But most are incapable of abstract thought. Lacking a filter on their experience, they""re powerless to make sense of it.xe2x80x9d
Said Newsweek article used the examples of forgetting whether you locked the door or turned off the lights or the oven. The example we use here is closing a garage door. However, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that this technique applies to a variety of routine tasks, not only those mentioned in the Newsweek article, but also such routine tasks as closing a gate (for example, but not by way of limitation, a gate guarding a house, a gate guarding a swimming pool), turning on the alarm system of a house or building and turning off a computer, coffee machine, copier, or the like. It is the intention of this disclosure to describe a device that is readily transportable (for example, but not by way of limitation, that is transported on a person or in a vehicle), that can be used to verify or xe2x80x9cremindxe2x80x9d the user that one or more routine tasks has been performed. Further, to limit this Disclosure to novel applications, we require that said routine tasks relate to a change in security associated with said object, that said change in security is operatively associated with the flow of electrons (herein xe2x80x9celectronicsxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9celectronic devicexe2x80x9d), and that said reminding device acquires its information from actions associated with the flow of events that are expected to occur from the initiation of the change in security of said object without further conscious input from the operator.
The present invention is based upon the discovery that, when a person remotely activates an electronic device (for example, by closing an electric garage door by pressing a button on a garage door remote opening and closing unitxe2x80x94the xe2x80x9ctransmitterxe2x80x9d), the mechanism associated with the process of pushing said button can be configured such that pushing said button causes, either directly or indirectly, the activation of a reminding device which records certain information related to said activation (for example, but not by way of limitation, the time of activation or whether said garage door became open or closed by said activation). Said reminding device is transported with the user and contains output means that discloses to the user, at a later time and another place, that the process (in this example the initiating of the closing of the electric garage door by pressing the transmitter button) was, in fact, accomplished.
It is a principal object of this invention to describe a device which is intended to be readily transported, either with a person or in a vehicle, which can remind or verify that an operation which changes the state of security of an object has been performed, where said change in security is operatively associated with the flow of electrons, and said reminding or verifying is performed through means which can be sensed by at least one of the five human senses.